All the leaves fell in terror to the earth, but the storm would not let them rest. He seized them round the waist and waltzed with them out over the field, high up into the air, and into the wood again, swept them into great heaps, and then scattered them in all directions--just as it pleased him. Not till morning came did the storm grow weary and lie down to rest. "Now you shall have peace for a time," he said. "I will take a rest till we have the spring cleaning. Then we can have another turn together--that is, if there are any of you left by then." And the leaves lay down to rest, and spread themselves like a thick carpet over the whole land. The anemones felt that it had become pleasantly warm. "Can it be my Lady Spring already?" they asked each other. "I haven't got my buds ready," shouted one of them. "Nor I! Nor I!" cried the others in one voice. But one of them took courage and peeped out over the earth. "Good-morning!" cried the withered beech leaves. "It is a little too early, little lady. I hope you will be none the worse for it." "Isn't it my Lady Spring?" inquired the anemone. "Not yet," answered the beech leaves. "It is only the green beech leaves that you were so angry with last summer. The green has gone from us, so we have no great finery to boast of now. We have enjoyed our youth and had our fling, I can tell you. And now we lie here and protect all the little flowers in the earth against the winter." "And meanwhile _I_ stand shivering in all my bare boughs," said the beech peevishly. The anemones talked it over one to another down below in the earth, and thought it was grand. "Those grand beech leaves!" they said. "Mind you remember this next summer when I burst into leaf," said the beech. "We will! we will!" whispered the anemones. But that sort of promise is easily made--and easily broken. THE MIST [Illustration: THE MIST] The sun had just gone down. The frog was croaking his "good-night," which lasted so long that there seemed no end to it. The bee was creeping into its hive, and little children were crying because they had to go to bed. The flower was closing up its petals and bowing its head; the bird was tucking its bill under its wing; and the stag was laying himself down to rest in the tall, soft grass in the glade of the wood. From the village church the bells were ringing for sunset, and when that was over the old clerk went home. On his way he had a little chat or two with the people who were out for an evening stroll, or were standing before their gate and smoking a pipe till they bade him good-night and shut the door. Then it grew quite quiet, and the darkness fell. There was a light in the parson's house, and there was one also in the doctor's. But the farmers' houses were dark, because in summer-time the farmers get up so early that they must go early to bed.